Europa Universalis IV

Cheers again chaps, must admit I'm now loving this game I stayed up (far too late) laying last night and continues my Portugal game. I colonised Bermuda and went to go for South America when war broke out with France, I panicked as they fleets loitering round there so I landed in the first place I could which was North America :p

No benefit to my trade which is blinking irritating but a good 6 territory colony going over there now.

I also land grabbed (still colonising) the cape territory where South Africa now sits as I'm going to use it to push as much trade as I can toward the Seville node.

Question though, do you get diminishing returns from utilising light ships to boost trade? I have around 30 light ships pottering round my Seville/Saris(?) nodes to push trade but not getting much from them I believe. Would I be better scrapping some or are they always worth just deploying more and more?
 
So long as you don't go over your fleet limit, getting more light ships is always a good thing as there is no real cap on how much they can boost trade income. You will have to pay attention to the trade nodes they are operating in however to work out the optimal placement ; no point adding extra protection to a trade a node you already have nearly 100% control over vs an upstream node that has almost no protection.
 
Another question as I cannot find an answer (appreciate all the help by the way!) is there any way to break up other countries alliances?

I have Sligo I want to conquer allied with Scotland but I don't want to fight both (as France will join in to help Scotland) is there any way to try and force Scotland to break an alliance?

Can't find any way to do it but there's plenty I don't know.

Got two expansions (the one that allows province development and another) so started again as England. It's a nightmare at first as my king is so useless I'm so slow generating monarch points!
 
No1newts said:
Another question as I cannot find an answer (appreciate all the help by the way!) is there any way to break up other countries alliances?

I have Sligo I want to conquer allied with Scotland but I don't want to fight both (as France will join in to help Scotland) is there any way to try and force Scotland to break an alliance?

Can't find any way to do it but there's plenty I don't know.

Got two expansions (the one that allows province development and another) so started again as England. It's a nightmare at first as my king is so useless I'm so slow generating monarch points!
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If you declare war on Sligo they can call in Scotland but Scotland CAN'T call in its allies. If you select Scotland as a co-belligerent then they CAN call in their allies. Co-belligerents are where you tick the box in the "Enemy Allies" section when declaring war.

Great Powers can also demand countries break their alliances.
 
Marvellous news, I'm actually allied with Scotland as well so hopefully they won't even declare.

If Scotland war with me can I peace with them and then continue the fight with Sligo or is it all in?
 
You can make a separate with the countries you're fighting by clicking on their flag in the peace treaty window.

Also, when you click 'declare war' it will tell you whether or not an ally will join, and if you hover the mouse over their name it will tell you why.
 
No1newts said:
Marvellous news, I'm actually allied with Scotland as well so hopefully they won't even declare.

If Scotland war with me can I peace with them and then continue the fight with Sligo or is it all in?
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The AI will honor defensive calls to arms more readily than offensive.

This means if you are for example playing Castille allied with Portugal, and France are also allied to Portugal, if you declare on France then Portugal will defend them over you and likely be against you in the war.

You can see what the AI would do if you declared by the ticks/crosses.

If you declare on Sligo and Scotland joins in on the other side, you can peace them out separately, they will stick around longer depending upon occupied provinces, war exhaustion, other wars they are in etc. White peace is the most basic one you can do, but they are unlikely to accept it early on unless you occupy some of their territory.

The great power action to demand break alliance will give you a truce with the country you force to break it, so for example if you want to declare war on Austria but they are allied with Brandenburg, you'd want to force Brandenburg to break the alliance with Austria rather than the other way around.

You can't do it too often though, and they may not accept it unless you are much bigger than they are.

The other thing to bear in mind is that you can ruin alliances with proxy ways, for example if France is allied to Navarre, and France has scary allies, you can isolate then by declaring on Navarre, which can only call it's allies in to the war. Also the AI can't be in a war on your side and against you at the same time. This means you can declare a war you don't really care about and invite them to join you, then you can declare on another enemy as well and even if they are allied together they can't join against you.
 
After all the worry Scotland came down on my side and I nailed Sligo extremely quickly. I'm just sitting on what I have now as I just unlocked exploration and waiting to spread across the seas. I want to take out Scotland but I can imagine breaking Loathian will be a nightmare.

My bloody useless king is still alive at 62, just die already!!
 
No1newts said:
After all the worry Scotland came down on my side and I nailed Sligo extremely quickly. I'm just sitting on what I have now as I just unlocked exploration and waiting to spread across the seas. I want to take out Scotland but I can imagine breaking Loathian will be a nightmare.

My bloody useless king is still alive at 62, just die already!!
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Make your king a general, it increases the chances of them dying. Even better if you make him lead every siege!
 
No1newts said:
After all the worry Scotland came down on my side and I nailed Sligo extremely quickly. I'm just sitting on what I have now as I just unlocked exploration and waiting to spread across the seas. I want to take out Scotland but I can imagine breaking Loathian will be a nightmare.

My bloody useless king is still alive at 62, just die already!!
Click to expand...

You can abdicate your ruler or remove bad heirs for a cost to stability/prestige, but it might be a specific DLC thing.
 
Once agin I stayed up too late playing this! My ruler died (hurrah!) I conquered Scotland (hurrah!) and I have a couple of provinces over in Canada growing up around a trade node which pumps directly into the North Sea trade node (which I dominate) which I'm then pushing into the English Channel which I have a good share of.

Just dealing with reformation at moment which is irritating and my income is down from 15g a turn to only 6g. Trying to find an "in" to get a grip on more of north Europe but the whole thing is a locked down cross cross of alliances that I doubt I can break.

Regards trade hub, can you switch your primary hub? I could probably pick up more cash from the North Sea node with the amount I'm going to be pumping into it. Also, will I draw an income from a node if it isn't my main one or is it all just used to shift trade?

Thanks agin!
 
You'll automatically collect from your home trade node, and you can use Merchants to collect from other nodes - although if I remember it takes a hefty cut (40% rings a bell?). You can collect from as many nodes as you have merchants really. Once you dominate your home trade node it's usually worth moving the merchant on to another node - you'll automatically collect and you won't miss the extra trade power that the merchant brings.
 
Well I'm in 1606 and stuck with a regency council which has delayed my expansion. I have the full north coast of Europe, New Foundland is a bustling colony up in Canada and I'm 6th overall in score. Genetallly a success and can see it petering out now, I really want to pick a fight with France at some point to teach the frogs a lesson but they are allied with the Ottomans and if they get involved I'm boned :p

Great game and already thinking what I can play next.
 
I'd recommend trying to do some of the achievements in Iron Man, just reading them gives you some ideas of what to play. I generally start a game with a goal in mind, and the achievements do help me set that goal :)

Be warned some are very hard indeed, some are very easy.
 
I kind of like the free form nature of it, I feel like it's been a successful game even without hitting a goal which is nice. I took all Northern Europe and it's literally just ticking down with me and France glaring at each other whilst I colonise Canada.

As an aside, what use are mikitary buildings? I've largely worked out the pro and cons and how to do trade etc to make money (43g a month at the mo) but the military side just makes no sense in regards to building buffs.
 
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